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Tag Archives: 1984
Orwell: “By 30 November 1948 it was virtually done.”
The story of Orwell writing 1984. It brought me to tears. It was a desperate race against time. Orwell’s health was deteriorating, the “unbelievably bad” manuscript needed retyping, and the December deadline was looming. Warburg promised to help, and so … Continue reading
The Books: “1984″ (George Orwell)
Daily Book Excerpt: Adult fiction: 1984, by George Orwell. I covered much of my thoughts about this book in my post yesterday about Animal Farm. A bit more about Orwell the man (there’s so much there): Orwell himself wrote about … Continue reading
Let’s Hear It For Grandiose Nerds
The other day Alex referred to me as a “grandiose nerd”. I think that about sums it up. I will now give you a tiny glimpse of what I did for about an hour this morning: I read Robert Conquest’s … Continue reading
“Grokking” Stalin And The Murder of Kirov
Update: I just realized that my description of 3 a.m. anxiety may obscure the rest of the post, which would be unfortunate. So if you want to skip over that part to get to the Stalin stuff, feel free. You … Continue reading
Posted in Books
Tagged 1984, George Orwell, Hopeful Monsters, Robert Conquest, Russia, Sergei Kirov, Stalin, The Great Terror
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“With its grace and carelessness it seemed to annihilate a whole culture, a whole system of thought…”
From George Orwell’s 1984, which I am now rereading: He could not remember what had happened, but he knew in his dream that in some way the lives of his mother and his sister had been sacrificed to his own. … Continue reading